The salient decorative feature of this devotional work is the illusionistic perspective created in the central plaque, where an ashlar-work arch encloses a sort of deep niche whose walls and floor are summarily represented by coral pieces of decreasing size. At the centre is the figure of St Joseph, flanked by two other saints. This work is virtually identical to a plaque displayed at the Coralli exhibition in 1986 (no. 35). Other works sharing the typically Baroque taste for perspectival illusions are illustrated by Daneu 1964, plates 2 and 3: two pieces in the collections of the Princes of Ligne at Beloeil and another in the Victoria and Albert Museum, the latter also particularly similar to ours in the rendering of the openwork frame.